Sensory Perception & Interaction, Research Group

A haptic interface is a particular kind of window through
which a user may experience or manipulate something
else. The purpose of this section is to explore the value
that the touch sense can provide in different contexts, and
to offer perspectives and principles for the creation of
haptic interaction models for specific applications.
We assume the perspective of an interface designer
considering haptic feedback as one potential interaction
medium. This designer needs first to create an interaction
model by which the application can most effectively be
perceived and controlled by the intended user, and that
model must be submitted to a critical and unbiased task
analysis. When (and if) haptic feedback emerges as part
of this model, the best morphology and mechanism for
the haptic interface device as well as its connection to the
rest of the application can be more readily specified and
created, using insights into hardware design and
psychophysics discussed elsewhere.
This is a “top-down” design approach, which begins with
a need (to provide an interface to a given application) and
aims to discover the solution from a suite of available
interface technologies and methods. At the same time, a
good understanding of where haptic interaction adds
value should help in identifying the applications for
which haptic feedback is a good fit – the “bottom-up”
approach. Section I examines different aspects of
physical interaction in the real world; Section II suggests
design principles for haptic interfaces which we hope are
just a beginning to an expanding understanding by the
field.